3 Steve Vai Licks From 1988

David Brucie here no episode three for all this is three Steve bylicks from 1988 and this episode is a continuation on the plane with feel series that I introduced back in August and September and we bypassed that series the month of October for Middle month and then last month I had the mick Goodrich you know Concepts and tribute which was important but I wanted to return to this series because I had some more ideas up my sleeve and really playing with feel in emotion and this emotive energy and expression is where it's at that's what all guitarists should be doing and really when you think about it I mean Steve is one of the most expressive guitarists I can think of I mean if you really think about everything he's done with a guitar in his hands we've heard him make a guitar talk scream growl like a tiger meow like a cat I mean there's all sorts of things we've heard him make his guitar laugh and all sorts of stuff so very expressive and very unique and interesting you know approaches and really tapping into some of buys you know expressive ideas is really beneficial because it's going to open your eyes to maybe some different approaches or you know different ways of playing notes or playing Melodies and licks and phrases and stuff like that so this is essential I commonly overlooked so here we go so definitely in 1988 Steve Vai was on fire I mean his career was on the rise you know it's post Zappa post flexible post Edom and smile technically 1988 that would have been skyscraper era and he hadn't released passion of warfare yet so Steve Vai really hadn't exploded exploded by 1988 he was literally exploding and growing you know in popularity and stuff like that so really exciting time in his career and there was so much going on and of course everything changed once he left Ross band and eventually released passion and warfare started working with White Snake and then the next thing he knew he was literally a bona fide guitar God but this is that transition and growth period of by his career which is so fascinating the licks in this episode came from bootlegs from the 1988 skyscraper tour and I was looking for very specific things from Steve you know and I wasn't worried about shredding and crazy licks and stuff which he's known for that but I was looking more for those emotive moments and really expressive you know phrases I love when Vai plays melodically and really you know whips out these you know different ideas and you know the first example is very basic and the last example is really complicated and crazy so I wanted to kind of show this kind of you know extreme form of very simple ideas and phrasing and then very complex phrasing you know from Steve Vai so here we go but the first lick really isn't a lick it's just a single note band but it's Steve vai's 12 second band and when I saw this footage immediately I thought well I'm gonna I'm gonna start with that because it kind of reminded me of his Martian love Secrets lessons and articles you know they were in guitar player back in the day it was like in the late 80s and that was before the big you know 10 hour so our workout that was in Guitar World but before that in guitar player he had a series of columns called Martian love secrets and in that series I think it was the second You Know lesson or article but he was talking about playing a single note for an hour and I know when I was a teenager and I read that article I was like one note for an hour and I remember sitting in my room you know trying it at least I don't know if I ever actually made it to an hour that's a very long time just sitting there nursing you know one note but I do remember playing with you know that idea so I wanted to start with this so here's the clip of Steve Vai just bending one note but it lets you know he lets it sustain for 12 full seconds or almost 12 seconds but check this out so before we attempt Steve vai's 12 second sustained Bend I wanted to include this and it's just kind of an edited transcript from bi's article you know from Martian love secrets and he's explaining this you know playing a note for an hour so I'm gonna let this run for about 10 seconds so you can actually read it if it changes you know or flips too fast you can pause it for sure but read you know what he's saying right here okay as far as the bend itself he's really just grabbing an e and bending that a whole step to F sharp right here on the B string just bend that 17th fret up a whole step and it's going to sound like the 19th fret you know that e to F sharp right here and let it sustain as long as you can that's about six seconds right there so like half as long as if I held it and the trick here is obviously you know there's kind of an unfair Advantage I guarantee when by sound checked for that concert on that stage um he probably walked around and figured out where the sweet spots were on that stage sweet spots being you know areas and certain distances you know from his amp where certain notes would sustain and feedback you know better than other places and they typically Mark you know the stage with Gaffers tape like axis and that shows them exactly where to stand where you can get that ideal you know sustained sound like that now of course I'm sitting beside my amp and I'm not like full performance volume I'm just kind of I'm not really that loud right here but you know if I standing on a concert stage full volume full everything so you definitely need some you know Distortion maybe a little bit of Reverb you could use some compression if you wanted to but the trick here is holding on to that note don't let go of it and it seems like a lot of players when they bend a note they want to get rid of it like it you know maybe it hurts their hand or it's hard but you want to just you know physically just grab that note bend it and hold on to it for dear life [Music] and let it sustain as long as you can that's really hard to do no vibrato just holding a note [Music] so that's really tough and this is kind of you know a version of his plan to note for an hour so obviously you're not going to sustain that one Bend for an hour the note's gonna die at some point you know VI is somehow magically holding that note for 12 seconds while these waving you know the crowd along but um just experiment with that now once you practice that bend you can continue this one note for an hour idea honestly you don't have to spend an entire hour playing one note unless you just want to that's very disciplined you know to sit there and practice like that but you can take this concept instead of doing a Bend you could just play you know single notes or you could slide or tap or whatever so here's you know e to F sharp Bend like I said you can play single notes you know e to F sharp maybe Ben behind the nut right there you could slide into the you know e to F sharp octo tapping notes whatever you want to do but right there you know we're grabbing that note and just experimenting you know seeing what we can do to make that note just sustain and just rain for as long as possible it's really tough but play around with that you know it's beneficial practice and the next time you bend a note you're gonna feel that practice and that time you spent working on that single Bend it's something that kind of you know filters over into your playing with other things but you know practicing one specific area like that it really does spread to other areas in your plane for some to think about next up is kind of the next step of practicing this now we're going to play a single Bend but we're going to pick it around 20 times or at least I count it 20 times and in this footage it's kind of grainy you know I mean it's VHS like bootleg so it's kind of hard to actually hear how many times if I picks this note or this Bend I counted 20 so I just decided to say 20 times but we're going to bend and pick the sustained note 20 times like this [Applause] something like that so we're bending this G to a and I'm literally sitting there counting how many times I played that and he changes you know like the Rhythm as far as how he's picking it sometimes it's spaced out sometimes it's picked close together but then you can also hear like vibrato on that note too so you're going to bend that g to a and just very aggressively you know shake the vibrato and continue picking that note like I said 20 times like this [Applause] foreign [Music] he basically grabs this F sharp bends it up a half step and back grabs that e to F sharp and then slides C to D at the end the hammer on that seated D2 you know something like that but uh of course the meat and potatoes here is that band and that's very demanding you're gonna definitely feel it in your front hand you're probably going to chew up your you know your calluses and your fingertips a little bit so the important thing to take away here is just targeting one specific thing and then repeating and drilling it over and over and over like that you know there we had one bent node and I continued to pick it and sustain it you know 20 times and you could apply this concept to almost anything you know sliding between notes and string skipping and scale sequences tapping or whatever you just Target one thing and then just drill it repeat it over and over and over like this [Music] like that and you could pick other notes you know you don't necessarily have to bend um and like I said you could try this with other things just drill something over and over and over it's really beneficial practice [Music] okay up next is kind of a signature lick from Steve Vines this slip and slide kind of intervolic thing like this and it's really interesting so it's basically based around it's basically kind of hinting at F sharp seven kind of mixolydian kind of we're starting with e [Music] so it's kind of like an almost like an e add 9 right there because this e to that b note and you're gonna grab this F sharp and then you're gonna slide e to F sharp right there on the D string that's where you hear that kind of blurry you know you hear the same note but you hear that kind of blurry slide before it like that thank you I love doing that kind of move and he does it again right here grab C sharp grab this B and then shift slide that into C sharp right there you basically hear him grab this F sharp twice he doesn't really slide him and grab the C sharp and slide that B to C sharp at the end like that [Music] you could also add another slide right there like this [Music] and I know buy does that too so you can definitely add that e note if you don't want to just double that F sharp [Applause] [Music] you could also expand that an octave higher and do it way up here way up there [Music] [Applause] but I love those phrases from VI where it's really unusual you're hearing that blurry shift slide and the note selection is interesting cool deck and definitely a signature sound from Steve Vai here's a bonus lick from this footage and it's very unusual very weird it's the smeared tap bending you can definitely hear from Steve Vai check out the attitude song If you want to find more licks like this it's very unusual very unorthodox but also very Steve Vai like this foreign something like that it's really weird so I'm gonna break this down so we're starting with this B no bent right here on the G string and then you're going to basically tap this a note but you're going to still have that note bent so it's going to sound like a b because of that bend but you're basically tapping a and you're going to release that bend and then I'm just sliding my pick you know my tapping hand there up a fret like this [Applause] really weird and then you definitely hear this F sharp then you're here on the Z sharp here and I'm hearing an e back here then you're hearing this C sharp and you see him move up here and grab C which is really weird like this [Music] and then you hear a B to C sharp that's the first pass right here [Music] here the next pass it starts the same [Music] you can basically tap this F sharp hammer on E to F sharp down here with your Brett hand and then he basically does that B to C sharp again I think he dips his bar for vibrato there [Music] he does this weird kind of tap slide right there I'm not really sure what he's doing there foreign [Applause] [Music] [Music] move your fret hand up grab e and then bend that e up to F sharp we've released to that C sharp like that and then this is really hard so you're going to basically grab this a bend that up and then you're going to tap this B note which is going to sound like C sharp which that's really hard to do to get it clean in there that's such an unusual lick it's so weird but it's so cool [Applause] [Music] [Applause] something like that you know thanks Steve I for cramping my fingers up geez [Music] thank you that's going to wrap this episode of three for all with three Steve violets from 1988 you know without question a dynamic and expressive guitarist and one of my biggest influences and I know initially it was Van Halen but I didn't feel right jumping over to Steve I you know I felt like I was betraying Eddie but then I discovered Joe Satriani and he became that stepping stone because I went from Eddie to Joe and then once I opened that door with Joe Satriani I couldn't help but just dive into Steve eye because it was right there and then I had Steve Vai Joe Satriani and Eddie Van Halen and that was the trifecta of my guitar playing you know my entire teenage years and still three of my biggest influences to this day so anyway leave some feedback and comments Please Subscribe now lessons and I'll be back before you know with more content material thank you

Channel: Late Night Lessons

Views: 18,447

Keywords: Late Night Lessons, David Brewster, Three For All, 3 Steve Vai Licks From 1988, Steve Vai, Steve Vai Lesson, Guitar Lesson, Guitar Licks, Guitar Tricks, Guitar Secrets, Guitar Solo, Lead Guitar, Live Solo, Live Guitar Solo, Shred Guitar, Rock Guitar, Shred Guitar Licks, String Bending, String Vibrato, Guitar Vibrato, Guitar Bending, Controlled Bending, String Bending Workout, Bending Exercise, Playing With Feel, Emotive Guitar, Melodic Guitar, Tapping, Tapping Licks

Id: LrtjlEvIxq0

Length: 17min 57sec (1077 seconds)

Published: Sat Dec 10 2022